ABSTRACT
Introduction This chapter has three main objectives, which are reflected in its structure. The first is to briefly examine some definitions and concepts underpinning discussions of social exclusion and sport from non-economic, social scientific literature and which have been discussed elsewhere in this volume.1 The second is to present the evidence from literature examining sports participation and its impacts, as well as some evidence from recent surveys on sports participation, to describe the current situation in the UK. The data will be used to draw comparisons between the 16 to 18-year-old age group, and older age groups.2 The third objective is to interpret the social exclusion literature and this informal and non-inferential empirical analysis from an economic perspective.
